Criminalisation of corruption and political financing in Finland - the Group
of States against Corruption (GRECO) publishes its first Third Round
Evaluation Report

[Strasbourg, 12/12/07] The Council of Europe’s Group of States against
Corruption (GRECO) has published today its Third Round Evaluation Report on
Finland. The report, which was adopted on 7 December 2007, has been made
public following the agreement of the Finnish authorities.

The Report, which contains 17 recommendations addressed to Finland, calls
for a more determined approach to the fight against corruption: GRECO found,
inter alia, the existing penal sanctions in respect of bribery too weak - in
the public as well as in the private sectors. GRECO also emphasised that
bribery of members of Parliament is too narrowly defined in Finnish law.
Moreover, GRECO recommends Finland to sharpen its present control over
political financing, to increase the transparency of donations to political
parties and election candidates as well as in relation to the way in which
the funds received are spent. GRECO furthermore recommends to strengthen
considerably the independence of the existing mechanisms involved in the
supervision of political funding in Finland and to make that supervision
more substantial and less formalistic. GRECO also calls for appropriate
sanctions for the violation of funding rules.

GRECO’s Third Evaluation Round focuses on two distinct themes, namely (i)
the criminalisation of corruption in accordance with the Criminal Law
Convention on Corruption (ETS 173) and its Additional Protocol (ETS 191);
and (ii) transparency of party funding in light of the Council of Europe
Recommendation Rec(2003)4 on Common Rules against Corruption in the Funding
of Political Parties and Electoral Campaigns.
GRECO, which will monitor the implementation of the recommendations to
Finland in the second half of 2009, through its specific compliance
procedure, was pleased to learn that Finland is about to establish a work
plan and a multidisciplinary working group to deal with GRECO’s
recommendations.